How many of us have passed through turnstiles? Do we ever remember them once we have successfully passed through them? Perhaps they are best remembered only before we are about to get turn through them for the fear of either being caught mid way or not allowed to turn and go to the other side.

Likewise, the challenges in life are like turnstiles. We initially fear these, because we have never tested our limits of overcoming challenges. We always take them as the biggest burden on our back, no matter how easy they may eventually turn out to be. We are colored in terms of our innate ability to be successful in all our endeavors and not be a failure. As a result of this unreasonable blurred logic that brings in more partiality towards success, we hate challenges and don’t want to pass through them as we believe we won’t be there on the other side with success, after overcoming them.

It is however not very difficult to overcome these challenges in life at various stages. These challenges are the equivalent of being a boat in the sea that rocks up and down due to the turbulence and buoyancy of the sea. The boat rocks up and down, but it is still able to sustain its momentum and move ahead. Per Newton’s third law: Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, so what goes up has to come down. Similarly the challenges that come up in life for any of us, have to go down the history of our existence after our successful conquest. And as these go down in the annals of history, on the boat called life we march ahead with the oars of optimism firmly clenched in our hands. The experience of this entire journey is worth cherishing for the rest of our lives.

The only reason why we are not optimistic about accepting challenges is because we fear of failure. But in the end, if one ponders deeper – what is it that we fear of? We fear of failure from what? We fear of failure from not trying anything and yet failing? Why can’t we boost ourselves and say – “Come on, let me have a go at it, I am sure I will overcome this. If not overcome, I will definitely have learnt something”. This small seed of optimism in our thought and approach can create a magic which will set us up for much greater wins in life. It’s all in the mind. The challenge is to take more challenges and assure yourself that you are going to overcome them. Even if you are not overcoming them, but are caught in between them, the optimism in your approach, the spring in your stride would definitely help you battle the challenges and emerge a winner.

Hope this will help you to pass through your mental turnstiles and perhaps make you “Turn-Style: Turn your fears in style” by embracing more challenges and converting them to opportunities.